Anna Tobine (Larsen) Spafford (1842 - 1923)

Born 16 Mar 1842 in Stavanger, Stavanger kommune, Rogaland fylke, Norway

Wife of Horatio Gates Spafford — married 1862 in United States of America

Descendants

Died 17 Apr 1923 at age 81 in Jerusalem, Yerushalayim (Jerusalem District), Israel

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Biography

Anna Tobine Larsen Oglende was born on on 16th March 1842 at Stavanger, Stavanger kommune, Rogaland fylke, Norway. NOTE: View her original birth/baptism here. #107. Anne Tobene

Anna's family migrated to the United States of America whilst she was quite young. Anna was a Sunday School student of Horatio Spafford's in 1857. He answered her many questions and led her to the Lord. Then, in 1858, he proposed; only to find out that she was sixteen - fourteen years younger than himself. Spafford's biographer states that she had lost her mother and brother to cholera and had nursed her father with tuberculosis until his death. Her father had become a hard-working farmer in northern Minnesota following their migration and had to endure raids by native Americans. After his death, Anna had moved in with an older sister who was living near Chicago. Horatio had moved to Chicago so that he could regularly hear the great evangelist Dwight Moody.^[1]

“Anna Larssen, later Americanized to Lawson, was born in Stavanger, Norway, in 1842. Horatio was immediately attracted by Anna's beauty and intelligence when she attended his Sunday school class in Chicago. When Horatio realized that Anna, fourteen years younger than he, was only fifteen, he arranged for three years tuition at a boarding school near Chicago before the idea of marriage could be discussed. The couple married in 1861.”^[2]

Anna married her Horatio, a Chicago lawyer and businessman, on 5th September 1861 in Chicago, with their nation at war - with itself! Horatio's business grew, and so did their family:

• Anna "Annie" Spafford (1862-73)
• Margaret Lee "Maggie" Spafford (1864-73)
• Elizabeth "Bessie" Spafford (1868-73)
• Tanetta Spafford (1871-73)

Chicago was destroyed by fire in 1871; and so too was Horatio's business and investment opportunities and specualtions. They decided to take a lengthy vacation in Europe, but Horation was delayed at the last moment aand would need to take a later ship. Anna and the girls went on ahead, aboard the French passenger steamer, said to be the grandest ship of its day, the "Ville du Havre". On 22nd November 1873 in the middle of the Atlaantic Ocean the grand ship was hit by a freighter and sank. Their four daughters were lost in the wreck.^[3]

After the disastrous Chicago fire and the ordeal at sea, Anna and Horatio Spafford became religious outsiders. They left their Presbyterian congregation and held faith-based prayer meetings in their own home. Their Messianic sect was dubbed "the Overcomers" by the American press.

Anna gave birth to three more children:

• Horatio Goertner Spafford (1875-80) died of scarlet fever
• Bertha Spafford Vester (1879-1968)
• Grace Spafford Whiting (1881-?)

Anna and Horatio were central in establishing the American Colony in Jerusalem in 1881. Colony members engaged in philanthropic work amongst the people of Jerusalem regardless of their religious affiliation and without proselytizing motives—thereby gaining the trust of the local Muslim, Jewish, and Christian communities. There, they adopted the teenage son of a Turkish Jew:

• Jacob Eliahu Spafford (1864-1932)

During and immediately after the First World War, the American Colony played a critical role in supporting the Muslim, Jewish, and Christian communities of Jerusalem through the great suffering and deprivations of the Eastern front and the Armenian and Assyrian Genocides. The American Colony did this by running soup kitchens, hospitals, orphanages and other charitable ventures.

Anna passed away on 17th April 1923 at Jerusalem, Yerushalayim (Jerusalem District), Israel, and is buried in American Colony Cemetery, Yerushalayim.

Sources

1. ↑ Phillips, Rachel. Well With My Soul. Barbour. Ohio, 2003
2. ↑ https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/americancolony/amcolony-family.html
3. ↑ Find-a-Grave:_Anna_Tobine_Larsen_Spafford

• 1870 US census: https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:S3HT-D429-BDJ?i=16&cc=1438024&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AM67K-6RV

• The_American_Colony_in_Jerusalem; accessed 8 Jul 2018.
• Wikipedia:_Anna_Spafford; accessed 8 Jul 2018.
• Norway Baptisms, 1634-1927," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:N7RL-8BM : 10 February 2018), Anne Tobine Larsdatter, 16 Mar 1842; citing ; FHL microfilm 126,313.

Father's Name: Lars Larsen

Mother's Name: Guri Tonette Andersdr